Re: Atlantiker and the IE arrival

From: Christopher Gwinn
Message: 1180
Date: 2000-01-27

John,
What evidence is there that the Belgae and the Picts were originally non-IE? This seems to go way too far. First of all, Pictish is almost non-existant in any record - but what remains we do have show it to be nothing more than a P-Celtic dialect closely related to Welsh which was Gaelicized after the Irish inroads into Scotland. Most of the more fantastical claims to Pictish linguistic origins seem to rest on misreadings of Ogam stones. The Pictish inscriptions seem to use a different orthography than traditional Irish Ogam, as might be expected by P-Celts adopting the alphabet to their own language. In any case, the tribes of the Pictish area seem fully Celtic in form and etymology.
 
Belgic seems likewise to be fully Celtic - I havn't noticed any grand divergeneces or substrate survivals which might indicate a non-Celtic origin to the language.
 
There don't seem to be any survivals of pre-Celtic languages in Ireland whatsoever. The use of Alba for Scotland is simply a Gaelicization of Albion - which is Elfydd in Modern Welsh - and means "visible world."